Family Time: Create Halloween magic on a shoestring budget

Tuesday

Sep 27, 2011 at 12:01 AMSep 27, 2011 at 9:00 PM

Weekly family rail, with Halloween decorating tips, a look at a Halloween movie and more.

Tip of the Week

Halloween decorations can be expensive if you buy them in a store, but don't let that stop you from capturing the spirit. It's easy to transform the things you already have around the house into spooktacular decorations your trick-or-treaters will love.

"Many people don't realize how easy it is to create Halloween magic from next to nothing," says Rust-Oleum designer Angie Stinner. "All it takes is a few beverage cans, terracotta pots, pumpkins, some paint and a little imagination."

Here are a few projects from the archives of paintideas.com to help you deck out your home for Halloween:

- Create a gaggle of ghoulish ghosts. Reclaim a few aluminum beverage cans from your recycling bin and rinse them thoroughly. Flip up the tab on each can so it's upright. After the cans are dry, take them outside and give them a couple of coats of white spray paint. Make sure you cover the entire surface and let them dry for about 24 hours. Then take a permanent marker or foam paint pen to draw on ghostly faces. Attach a 4-by-4 piece of thin gauze to each can by draping it over the top and affix a pipe cleaner or piece of yarn through each tab to hang. They're perfect for decorating a porch, entry hall - even your child's room.

- Paint a pumpkin. Give a traditional Halloween activity a new twist. Paint a few pumpkins you've picked at the pumpkin patch. Give them 24 hours to fully cure, and then use chalk to draw pictures or write messages like "Boo," "Go Batty" or "Happy Halloween." Line them up on the steps leading to your front door and you're ready to welcome trick-or-treaters. Or purchase mini-pumpkins at your local supermarket and spray paint. Place them in a basket on your dining room table or scatter them around your house for a sophisticated alternative to the traditional painted pumpkin. The paint will preserve your pumpkins so they last through Thanksgiving.

- Pilgrim's landing. Here's a project that can make your Halloween party extra festive and make great placeholders for your Thanksgiving table, too. Purchase several inexpensive 4- inch terracotta pots or recycle some you may have in your garage. Take them outside and give them a couple of coats of paint. After the pots are completely dry, cut felt circles slightly larger than the opening of the pot and attach them with a hot glue gun. Then decorate the pots with orange ribbon, candy corn, dried flowers or other seasonal decorations to make festive pilgrims' hats. If you spray painted your pots, you can use a silver permanent marker to write names on the pots - or leave them as they are and use them again to decorate your Thanksgiving table. If you used the chalkboard paint, use any color chalk. The chalk will erase easily so your pilgrims' hats can be used over and over again.

- ARA

Family Movie Night

This month we’ll be highlighting the top family-friendly Halloween movies.

“Monsters, Inc.”

Rated: G

Length: 93 minutes

Synopsis: Monsters generate their city's power by scaring children, but they are terribly afraid of being contaminated by children, so when one enters Monstropolis, top scarer Sulley finds his world disrupted. – Disney/Pixar

Book Report

“Shelter (Mickey Bolitar Series #1)” by Harlan Coben

Ages: Young adult

Pages: 288

Synopsis: Mickey Bolitar’s year can’t get much worse. After witnessing his father’s death and sending his mom to rehab, he’s forced to live with his estranged uncle Myron and switch high schools. A new school comes with new friends and new enemies, and lucky for Mickey, it also comes with a great new girlfriend, Ashley. For a while, it seems like Mickey’s train wreck of a life is finally improving — until Ashley vanishes without a trace. Unwilling to let another person walk out of his life, Mickey follows Ashley’s trail into a seedy underworld that reveals that this seemingly sweet, shy girl isn’t who she claimed to be. And neither was Mickey’s father. Soon, Mickey learns about a conspiracy so shocking that it makes high school drama seem like a luxury — and leaves him questioning everything about the life he thought he knew. - Penguin Group (USA) Incorporated

Did You Know

A study in Australia found that heavy 4- and 5-year-olds are more likely to have social problems as they get older.

GateHouse News Service

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